CALDWELL — Warning residents New Jersey will “drive into bankruptcy” if it doesn’t reel in entitlement spending, Gov. Chris Christie set his sights on public workers’ health care benefits today.

The governor, who has made railing against the rising cost of health care benefits for public workers a recent staple of his town hall meetings speeches, appears to be sending the clearest sign yet that any forthcoming proposal to introduce pension reforms in the coming weeks will include proposed changes to health benefits.

“Let’s talk about some things that are unsustainable going forward,” said Christie during a Caldwell town hall.

“Here’s one thing that Barack Obama and I agree on,” he said. “(The president) looks at the New Jersey public health care plan for public workers and says it’s a ‘Cadillac plan.’”

If the state doesn’t make changes to public workers’ health care plans, New Jersey will be taxed “a fine” for its so-called “Cadillac plan” beginning in Fiscal Year 2018, Christie said, referring to changes under the Affordable Care Act.

“That’s not me making that decision, that’s the Democratic president of the United States making that decision,” Christie said.

He added: “This is what I was dealt with and this is what I have to deal with.”

The governor has promised in recent weeks to unveil more pension reforms at some point this summer.

He railed against unions, suggesting they knew the economic woes the state would face down in years to come when elected officials agreed to pension and health care benefits changes.

“The union folks, they knew that it wasn’t going to be paid for and they knew that there was no plan on how to pay for it,” he said. “What they hoped was that every time there became a problem that whoever was in charge at the time would be politically pressured to just raise taxes again, again and again, and again.”

Christie declared he wouldn’t proceed down that road.

“If you want to drive this baby off the cliff when somebody is behind the wheel, that’s your call, you vote for somebody who will, who will sing you a sweet song, and will smile and whisper in your ear and then stick it to you as soon as you turn your back,” Christie said. “That’s not going to be me. I’m going to tell you what I think and what needs to be done.”

The statements came after Christie defended his decision to reduce payments to the public-worker pension system to balance the new state budget. He signed a budget bill Monday evening.